Greek-revival-style home on Boulevard was once a place humming with children

Greek-revival-style home on Boulevard was once a place humming with children

photos by Sefton Ipock/Independent Mail
The Dexter Brown house at 608 Boulevard is one of the most recognizable houses in Anderson.$RETURN$$RETURN$

Independent Mail

Inlaid detail work in the floor is featured in many rooms in the Dexter Brown house.$RETURN$$RETURN$

Independent Mail

Have you ever passed a unique house during your travels through the area and wondered about its history? Or have you seen an old home, with obvious history, falling in on itself and wondered if someone will ever step in to save it?

This new series, Historied Homes, will be an attempt to answer those questions about some of the notable homes in the area. Periodically, the Independent Mail will feature one of these local homes, tell its story and pull together information about what is being done to preserve these historic estates and how their owners can receive help with the preservation of the oldest residences in the region.

Do you know of an interesting local historical home that should be highlighted? Call Charmaine Smith-Miles at 864-260-1260 or send her an email at milesca@independentmail.com.

he large two-story, columned home at 608 Boulevard has been pictured in local history books, has been drawn by artists for postcards, and has been a popular stop on Anderson Heritage’s Tour of Homes.

But to Lillian Brown Glenn, it is simply home.

She has lived in a stately brick home on Whitehall Road, near the intersection of North Avenue, for 63 years now. But her first home was the estate that neighbors Boulevard Baptist Church.

For her, the grand staircase that flows from the second story of the house to the foyer is where she walked on the way to her wedding, which happened in the first-floor parlor.

She also remembers, fondly, the times she spent as a teen on the tennis courts that once occupied part of the yard.

“I was born in that house, I grew up in that house, and I married in it,” Lillian said. “I always thought it was a perfectly beautiful house.”

Now, the house is empty.

The Brown family sold it in 1979 to Boulevard Baptist Church. Since then it has been sold two more times, giving the home a total of four owners since it was built.

When the church owned the estate, the house was used for Sunday school classes, wedding receptions, ladies’ luncheons and other functions. The church updated the wiring in the home, added a new heating and cooling system and made some other updates.

In 1997, the church was sold to Mary and Peter Perdomo, according to Anderson County records.

A history of the home, written by Lillian’s sister, Elizabeth Wakefield, said the Perdomos restored the interior and exterior of the home and built a new garage behind it. For them, the home was their primary residence.

The Perdomos bought the home in 1998 and sold it to Janet Dorado in 2003. Dorado moved from Atlanta and lived there until she died in 2011. Since then her son has put the estate up for sale. It now is under contract, according to a sign posted out front.

Moyer Albergotti, a member of the city’s Board of Architectural Review and a local Realtor, said she loves homes like the one on Boulevard.

The bigger homes do take extensive upkeep, but they have histories and architectural details that cannot be matched by most newer homes. “You can’t duplicate homes like this,” Albergotti said. “Once they are lost, they are lost.”

Lillian’s father, one of Anderson’s leading businessmen, was behind the home’s construction.

Dexter Brown, who was a cotton farmer and owner of a downtown grocery that bore his name, built the house in 1911.

Dexter owned several farms, one that covered about 200 acres on Centerville Road where he grew up and another one on Anderson’s west side that included about 400 acres, his daughter said.

“I remember when the men used to bring the bales of cotton in from the farms and store them in the barn until Daddy could get the best price and it was time to sell,” Lillian said.

When it was built, Boulevard was the edge of the city’s residential area on that side of town. There was no towering Boulevard Baptist Church next door. And at the end of the street, to the south, Anderson University — then Anderson College — was just going up.

Originally, the land included four acres in the rear that was used as a pasture for a short period. That land was later developed into eight building lots in the late 1940s.

Dexter Brown and his first wife, Eula Donnald, decided to build the house when their previous home on Calhoun Street burned, Lillian said. The columns that now stand like sentinels at the front of the home on Boulevard were part of the house that burned, she added.

“I am not sure how they were able to save those columns,” Lillian said. “And I think papa always thought the house on Calhoun was prettier than this one.”

But the house on Boulevard afforded the family — which included eight children — enough space so that they could each have bedrooms. The home also was not without its special characteristics.

It is modeled after a Greek-revival home that the Browns saw in St. Louis. They commissioned Anderson architect Joseph H. Casey to travel to St. Louis and make a drawing of the home that they could use as a model. When finished, the home and the outbuildings on the property cost $10,000. The price just for the property was $6,500.

The house, which has been added onto since the Browns sold, covers 6,000 square feet, has five and a half bathrooms and 11 original tiled fireplaces. Originally, it was built with six bedrooms.

“When the house was built, Mr. Brown had his architect put in a number of features, one of the most beautiful being the hardwood floors,” Wakefield wrote in her history of the home. “A crew from Minnesota laid the Indiana quartersawed white oak with mahogany inlay border from Atlanta.”

Those floors, with the ornate inlay, are still one of the distinctive architectural details of the building.

Plaster ceiling medallions and egg and dart and dentil cornice moldings were made in Columbia and installed in the home.

“Later the molds were broken so there could be no copies,” Wakefield wrote.

Another special feature of the home was in the backyard.

Originally, the house was not equipped with a laundry room, as washing machines and dryers were a luxury that had not been invented yet. Instead, there was a wash bench in the backyard with four large wash pots on it. A small ironing house was built in the backyard.

It took the home’s laundry staff four days to complete it all, two days to wash and two days to iron.

“We had a lot of people living under one roof,” Lillian said. “Can you imagine ironing shirts for all those men? I don’t think anyone appreciates a washing machine and a dryer more than I do.”

One of the fondest memories from her childhood is of a reception that happened at the home, Lillian said.

Her father’s first wife died in 1912 of cancer. They had two children together. Four years later, he married Frances Finley from York, S.C. They had six children.

Frances “loved to entertain and kept a guest book, which eventually contained thousands of names,” Wakefield wrote.

When Lillian was about 10 years old, her mother was the hostess of a reception at their home for her sister-in-law, Frances Harper. Frances married one of the oldest Brown boys, J. Donald. She was from Greenwood.

Frances Brown decided to offer a reception to welcome the bride to Anderson. More than 2,000 people attended the event, Lillian said.

“I think everyone who was invited came,” she said. “That was the biggest party she ever gave. Cars were parked on both sides of the street. I just remember all those cars.”

Later, when Lillian and Boyce Glenn married, there was no such reception. It was 1945, during World War II, and Lillian kept the ceremony simple, she said.

She wore her sister’s wedding dress, and the ceremony took place in the parlor of the home. Lillian can still remember seeing her father waiting for her at the bottom of that grand staircase.

“I have nothing but happy memories from that house,” said Lillian, who is now 89. “It was a happy, happy household.”